


Frontier Business

by Cpt_Obvious



Series: Rua Elan [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Almost everybody needs (and gets) a hug, Alternate Universe - Dieselpunk, Alternate Universe - Firefly, Alternate Universe - Human, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Lena Luthor is a captain, Like really slow if I can get away with it, Mon-El (Supergirl TV 2015) is Mike, Mon-El doesn't interfere, Sam is Lena's first mate, Slow Burn, Sort Of, tragic backstories
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:00:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24577216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cpt_Obvious/pseuds/Cpt_Obvious
Summary: PERSONAL UPDATE:Unfortunately, I have to put the series on hold for the time being. About a week ago, I lost my job, and now I'm scrambling to get my act together, apply for unemployment benefits, look for other jobs, and all that stuff. I'm sorry guys, I hope I can get back to it soon!Captain Lena Kieran of the gunboatRua Elanand her small crew are doing fine. Scratch that; all things considered, they're doing rather well, scraping by one job at a time, living on too strong coffee substitute, cheap booze and different-colored mush. Until one day they take a job that will throw their lives off track and ultimately might force Lena to face a legacy she thought she had left behind for good.This is the first episode of a series strongly influenced by the TV series "Firefly". It plays in a human inhabited Dieselpunk world with a technology level around the 1930s - 1940s. Metropolis is the capital of a Federation, Daxam and Krypton are just two other nations, and our baby Lena is the captain of her own airship. Action, adventure and feelings ensue!Also: A nice theme Song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1IVZpk_rVo
Relationships: Because these two are great and I love them, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Samantha "Sam" Arias/Alex Danvers
Series: Rua Elan [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1788466
Comments: 23
Kudos: 51





	1. Saturday Night Fight

**Author's Note:**

> As with the last one, English isn't my native language, and I don't have a beta reader. So there will be mistakes, and they're all mine. Sorry, guys!

"Life can be a real asshole."

\- Samantha Arias

**Port Eddington**

**Southern Fringe**

**Evening**

Well, this could have gone better.

To be fair, everything _was_ going pretty well, at first. They agreed to meet in Veronica Sinclair’s pub, Lena’s favorite place in town for doing business. She and Ronnie knew each other for what seems like ages, and while Lena would never say that she trusts Ronnie (only three people have ever earned that privilege), she could at least rely on her discretion.

Right on time, her contact Rico came with a couple of his goons, as one does in this line of work, they sat down, he showed them the money, and they showed him the package. Beer arrived, and Lena really wanted to get this deal done as soon as possible, because Rico was a sleazy bastard, whose eyes were practically glued to her tits, and every second she spent in his vicinity increased her craving for a shower. But that was not how Rico envisioned this evening. He smugly drank his beer, then said that he really liked the way how they had done the job, but he also _really_ did _not_ like to pay them.

That was when things got out of hand, because of course Mike would have none of this. After all, Mike really liked money – liked it so much, in fact, that Lena had wondered why he was willing to work for the little coin she offered. Turns out the answer is: because Mike is stupid as f … ishmeal. A whole sack of it, in fact.

Lena knows that for sure now, because she definitely is _not_ stupid and therefore aware that you do not start a fight with four armed men, one of which has a damn _submachine gun_ , in a closed space. She should have listened to Sam and never hired the guy. Probably a little stupid of herself there, she has to admit.

But hindsight is twenty-twenty, and so now she cowers behind the bar in the back of the pub, Ronnie right next to her and Sam a little further away, all the while Rico and his goons are shooting the crap out of Ronnie’s place.

“Why do you always have to start fights in _my_ fucking pub!”, Ronnie snaps and fidgets with the sawed-off shotgun she stores below the bar. Her snake tattoos seem to come alive in the dim light.

“Come on, I can’t be the only one”, Lena retorts, when a volley of gunfire hits the bottles lined up behind the bar, showering them with bits of broken glass and booze definitely too good to be wasted like that.

“Not the fucking point, Lena!”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have named your pub _Crossfire_.”

“Stop quipping and start shooting!”, Ronnie yells, opening up with her shotgun once more.

Lena follows suit, blindly firing her revolver in the direction where she supposes the man with the SMG hides, before ducking down and reloading.

“It was hardly my fault this time”, she mutters.

“Is it ever?”, Ronnie grits out. “This moron is part of _your_ crew!” To punctuate her statement, Ronnie fires off another shot. Someone screams in pain. “Reloading!”

“I’ll cover you”, Sam announces, rising out of cover and shooting with both her pistols.

_Where the hell is Mike?_

The SMG immediately returns fire, stuttering loudly while a hail of bullets hits the bar and the wall behind it, sending glass bits and sharp wooden splinters flying in all directions. Sam screams and goes down, one hand pressed on her left temple, while her gun clatters to the floor. Lena is over her in seconds, her own weapon forgotten. She sees blood and some splinters in Sam’s hair, but Sam seems more disoriented than hurt. So Lena grabs Sam’s fallen pistol and tries to get a couple of shots off, while Ronnie is still ramming new rounds into her shotgun.

It is of no use. Lena cannot even aim her weapon before she is driven back into cover by a barrage of bullets, SMG and handgun rounds alike.

“How many left?”, Ronnie asks, finally chambering a round and blindly firing over the top of the bar.

“Three, I think. They’re trying to flank us.”

“Well, shit.”

Meanwhile, Sam got on her knees again. Still disoriented, she tries to rise for a shot, but Lena manages to pull her back into cover just in time to not get hit. “Stay down!”

Her mind races in search of a solution for their situation, and she does not like the results. While the bar offers the best cover in the room, they are hopelessly pinned down. Their ammunition will not last for much longer, and then they will be down to Lena’s cutlass, Sam’s knife and whatever Ronnie has stashed behind the bar aside from her shotgun. It is only a matter of time until someone gets close enough to just lean over the bar and end them. In her desperation, Lena toys with the idea of trying to improvise a couple of fire bombs with some of the bottles that are still intact and pieces of her own shirt, when there is a sudden break in their opponent’s fire.

Quickly, Lena gets on her feet, gun in hand, and sees a slender woman with red hair who attacks Rico’s people from behind. The newcomer wears simple dark work pants, a button down shirt and sturdy, flat shoes – and she can _fight_. Right now, she grabs the SMG of Rico’s man, pulling him off balance and unloading her own gun into his stomach when he stumbled towards her.

After her intervention, the fight is over in seconds. The redhead fires again and ducks out of the way when another one of Rico’s goons turns on her. Mike emerges from behind a table, presumably his hiding spot for the whole time, tackles the guy and smashes his head against the wooden floor boards.

Finally, Lena spots Rico behind a turned over table where he had taken cover. Surprised by the sudden turn of events, he stands up, the three women behind the bar seemingly forgotten. Lena doesn’t hesitate, raises the pistol and pulls the trigger. The bullet hits Rico high in the shoulder, and the impact whips him around before he falls to the ground, screaming in pain. The sudden silences roars in Lena’s ears, and she takes a moment to calm her breathing. Slowly, she hands the pistol back to Sam and picks up her own revolver.

“Yeah, that’ll show you to not mess around with us”, Mike whoops in the meantime. The redhead, who waits near the door with her gun still in hand, gives him an annoyed look. Sam curses under her breath and looks ready to go for him, but Lena catches her elbow, shaking her head. Then, she steps out from behind the bar and walks over to Rico, who is now curled up into a whimpering ball on the floor. Broken glass and other debris crunches below her heavy boots. Adrenaline still pulses through her body, but she forces herself to calm down. From the corner of her eyes she sees Sam following her, glaring daggers at Mike, who seems completely unfazed by that. Lena also feels the eyes of the woman at the door on her the whole time, but ignores it. First things first.

She kicks Rico to turn him on his back, pinning him down with her foot firmly placed on his sternum. His bright shirt is soaked with blood over the right shoulder.

“Alright, Rico”, she starts quietly. “Since you don’t seem to have any idea how I conduct my business, I’m taking it upon myself to educate you. Are you listening?” Rico just growls, so Lena applies a little more pressure. “I can’t hear you, Rico.”

“Yes”, he wheezes. “I’m listening.”

“Great.” Lena smiles down on him. “See, when I do a job, I’m doing my part of the deal _exactly_ as demanded. In return, I expect to be paid _exactly_ as much as I was promised. Do you think that’s reasonable?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“So you get it, I’m glad.” Lena’s smile vanishes in a heartbeat. “Now, let me be very clear: I will take the money you promised me, and then everything else of value you have on you. As compensation, so to speak. Then I’ll let you leave with your package – because we had a deal. But if you so much as _breath_ in my direction ever again, I will put you down like the little rat you are.”

After a moment, Rico nods frantically, his face an unhealthy shade of grey. Lena bows down and relieves him of her money, a little extra cash and the cheap wrist watch he is carrying. “Get out.”

Rico does not need to be told twice. Swaying dangerously, he gets up and scurries towards the door. He has only made it a couple of steps when an impossibly loud shot booms right behind Lena. Rico’s back is ripped open in an explosion of fabric and blood, and his lifeless body falls down like a marionette whose strings have been cut.

Lena whips around and finds Ronnie standing behind her, the smoking shotgun in her hands. “Goddamn it, Ronnie!”

“What? You think I let this guy shoot up my place and then just walk away? If you want to play business woman, you got to do it somewhere else.” She stretches out her hand. “You owe me big time for this mess. And don’t even think about taking this guy’s package.”

“You don’t even know what’s in it”, Sam interjects.

Ronnie just shrugs, unfazed. “I don’t care. He was willing to kill for it, so it’s definitely worth something.” She turns back to Lena, waggling the fingers of her still outstretched hand.

Without hesitation, Lena hands over the money and the wrist watch.

“Hey, what are you doing?”, Mike complains and steps closer.

“You people ruined my pub. _Again_ ”, Ronnie retorts and holds up the money. “With this, I say we’re even, and that’s damn generous of me.”

“Oh, come on, sweetheart, you can’t –“

Lightning-fast, Ronnie whirls around and presses the muzzle of her sawed-off shotgun under Mike’s chin. “Listen, dipshit”, she hisses. “I’ve just had a _hell_ of an evening. Call me sweetheart again, and I won’t mind the extra cleaning job and blow your _fucking_ brains out. Got it?”

Mike visibly swallows, but manages a minimal nod. Ronnie keeps her weapon in place for a little longer, then turns around and stalks over to the bar. “Now, help me clean up this shit.”

After a couple of seconds, Mike sighs and rubs his neck. “I get the feeling she doesn’t like me very much.”

Sam slaps him on the back of his head. “Shut up, Mike.”

“You coming, or what?”, Ronnie yells.

Lena gives Sam and Mike a nod, and the both of them walk over to Ronnie at the bar. Suppressing a sigh, Lena turns back to the bullet-riddled front door.

Despite the new outburst of violence, the redhead has not moved an inch, her pistol now put away in a holster on her hip. “Nice speech. I would’ve just put a bullet in his head and be done with it.”

“That’s not how I do business.”

The other woman focuses her gaze on Lena, her brown eyes sharp. “And why’s that?”

“Let’s just say I’m all about second chances”, Lena replies, holstering her revolver.

Her answer draws a dry chuckle from the redhead. “Can’t say I’ve met a lot of people with that attitude in this corner of the world.”

“I take that as a compliment.” Lena narrows her eyes and looks at the other woman more closely. Her stance, her demeanor, her vigilant eyes, all of that practically screams combat experience. But then again, she doesn’t look like a bounty hunter or a mercenary. That would leave military or law enforcement, neither of which one can typically find in Port Eddington.

“Anyway”, Lena continues after a couple of seconds. “Thank you for your assistance, Miss …?”

“Johnson”, the redhead says, the name sounding so well practiced that Lena is sure it is fake. Not that she would hold that against the woman. She is no hypocrite.

“Captain Lena Kieran”, she introduces herself with her own alias, “of the airship _Rua Elan_.”

The redhead smiles thinly, then jerks her chin vaguely in Mike’s direction. “That guy part of your crew, too?”

“For now.” Lena quirks an eyebrow, hoping ‘Miss Johnson’ did not help them just to get her hands on Mike herself. She really could do without another firefight. “Do you have a problem with him?”

“That depends.” Johnson’s smile widens. “I want to offer you a job.”


	2. Piece of Cake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena and the gang get a new job.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was on a roll and decided to upload this chapter right away. Just because the first chapter on its own is quite short, and this one at least provides more background to the world and what "Miss Johnson's" job is about.
> 
> Please, enjoy! :-)

**Port Eddington**

**Southern Fringe**

**Evening**

In the end, Lena agrees with Miss Johnson to meet two hours later in a diner right at the airport. Right now, she is in no shape to negotiate a contract, her hair and clothes sweat-stained, soaked with booze from the smashed bottles behind the bar and littered with tiny glass fragments and wooden splinters. She also wants time to look after Sam, who luckily got away with several small cuts, but didn’t hit her head like Lena had feared. And, last but not least, there is Ronnie who insists they help clean at least part of the remains of the gunfight.

All in all, it takes them over an hour to get everything sorted out and leave the _Crossfire_. The evening air is hot and humid, and the streets in Port Eddington’s dock area – between the air and the sea port of the city – are buzzing with life. Ship crews on shore leave are getting plastered, pick pockets try their luck, small time criminals hang around in dark corners and street vendors try to sell food, clothes, weapons and all other imaginable wares from their booths. Nothing on the street hints at the full-blown firefight in one of the pubs of the area a little over sixty minutes ago – no panic, no fear, no law enforcement. As long as not one the major gangs or syndicates of the city is involved, no one cares about a few dead bodies. Flying bullets and the occasional explosion are more like a local environmental hazard in Port Eddington.

Lena waits until they pass the first sufficiently deserted alley, then grabs Mike by the collar of his shirt and drags him around the corner. Meanwhile, Sam positions herself on the side walk of the main road to ensure they won’t be disturbed.

“What the _hell_ were you thinking back there, starting a fight with four armed men?”, Lena snaps at Mike.

He raises his hands, surprised by her sudden outburst. “Hey, now, where does that come from all of a sudden?”

“I don’t yell at crew members in front of business partners or potential customers. Because I’m a professional. And that’s exactly the point.” She places her hand on the hilt of her cutlass. “We may be mercenaries and sometimes smugglers or thieves for hire, but we’re also _professionals_. And that means that I expect my people to not only follow orders, but to _think_ before they act.”

“Yeah, you know what I thought?”, Mike retorts and sets his jaw defiantly. “I thought it’s not really ‘professional’ to let Rico rip us off.”

“And so you just started a fight. Did you have any actual plan besides ‘start shooting and hoping for the best’? I don’t think so.”

“It worked out just fine, didn’t it?”

“Yes, _accidentally_ ”, Lena stresses, then exhales slowly. “If you want to get yourself killed, be my guest. I won’t stop you. But you will _not_ endanger any other member of my crew with your reckless behavior ever again. Is that understood?”

Mike tries to resist the intense gaze of her green eyes, but ultimately fails. “Understood”, he grits out.

“Excellent. Now, go ahead to the ship and bring Jack up to speed. We won’t be long.”

Mike glares at her for another moment, then starts to turn away before he stops himself. Lena bristles in expectance of more backtalk, but instead he just clenches his jaw and nods. “Sorry, captain. It won’t happen again.” With that, he turns around and stalks out of the alley.

After a moment, Sam strolls over to her and crosses her arms. “Well, that was unexpected. Who would’ve thought he had it in him?”

“Let’s hope he actually makes good on it.” Lena puts her hands in her pockets and allows her shoulders to sag. “I know what you really want to say.”

Sam raised her eyebrows. “Oh, and what’s that?”

“That I shouldn’t have hired him.”

“Actually, I wanted to say that you should’ve fired him.”

Lena suppresses a sigh and pinches the bridge of her nose. “You’re right”, she admits. “The problem is, the main gun doesn’t fire on its own.”

“Jack and I can manage that just fine.”

“And who’s doing damage control if Jack helps you operate the cannon?” When Sam doesn’t answer, Lena continues: “Four people is the absolute minimum to crew the ship. We need him until we can hire some additional hands. But for that to happen, we need to make money, first.”

“I know how it works, Lena”, Sam bites out. “I’m just worried, is all. Not only because Mike’s stupid. He also isn’t particularly loyal.”

“Only Jack and you are.” Lena smiles at Sam and puts a hand on the taller woman’s shoulder. “Come on, let’s see what this potential new job is about.”

“I don’t trust this ‘Miss Johnson’”, Sam mutters.

“Why? Because she uses an obviously fake name?”

“No, because nobody with legs like _that_ can be up to any good.”

Lena chuckles. “I’m glad you’re keeping your eye on the important details, Sam.”

“Just doing my job, Cap.”

*** * ***

About forty-five minutes later, they leave a still sulking Mike to guard the ship and go to a small diner near the airport that offers service around the clock. Sam and Lena order a cheap, but much needed beer while Jack, as usual, keeps it strictly non-alcoholic. Eventually, they settle on a table somewhere in the back with a clear view at the front door, but also close to the rear exit. Although the diner seems harmless enough with its long counter, the bored young woman behind it, the sputtering coffee maker and the shabby tables and chairs, one can never be too careful.

Jack takes a sip from his mug and closes his eyes. “Mhm”, he hums. “You can’t beat the flavor of stale, warmed up coffee substitute on a muggy evening. I tell you guys, that’s why I’m out here every day, doing my job.”

“Jack, the thing I love about you the most”, Sam playfully smoothes out his downright offensively colored, wildly-patternd shirt, “is that you got _taste_.”

“Damn straight.” Jack grins at her, then looks at Lena. “So, is there anything else we know about this ‘Miss Johnson’, aside from the fact that she can fight and offers us a job?”

Lena shrugs lightly. “Sam thinks she’s got great legs.”

“Uh … awesome.” Jack nods. “And that’s relevant for the mission … how?”

“You’re totally taking what I said out of context”, Sam grumbles. When the front door opens, she raises her eyebrows. “Speaking of the devil …”

Lena looks over to the door and sees Miss Johnson enter, still clad in her work pants and button-down shirt. Though now, she also has a big, olive-green backpack slung over her shoulder. Vigilant brown eyes scan the diner in a well-practiced fashion, until she spots the three of them in the back. So, not only combat experience, but also clearly used to look after herself in mundane, but unsafe environments. Interesting.

“Miss Johnson”, Lena greets her when she arrives at their table. “You already know my second-in-command Miss Arias.” She points at Jack. “And this is Jack Spheer, my chief engineer.”

Jack smoothly stands up and extends his hand. “A pleasure.”

Johnson seems to be taken aback by his politeness, but quickly recovers and shakes his hand with a stiff smile. As if to drive home a point, Jack pulls a chair out for her before taking a seat again. When Johnson sits down, she seems guarded and tense, certainly not uncommon for a meeting with people one wants to hire for presumably violent work. But Lena also spots an all-encompassing tiredness in the woman, the kind of bone-deep exhaustion that has become such a permanent companion she probably doesn’t even register it anymore. It’s a state Lena remembers far better than she dares to admit.

“Do you want to order something?”, Lena asks, well aware that the waitress will not approach their table of her own accord. Workshy personnel is one of the advantages of this place.

“Thanks, I’m good”, Johnson says and quickly glances at her wrist watch. “I’d rather get straight to business, if that’s alright with you. It’s getting pretty late.”

 _Alright_ , Lena thinks. _No more pleasantries, then._ “Of course. What do you want us to do for you?”

Johnson licks her lips, before she leans forward and puts her forearms on the table. “There is an airship, an unarmed light freighter, passing through this region tomorrow. No official flight plan has been recorded with any authorities, and the ship travels far off from all shipping lanes. However, I know an area approximately six hundred miles from here where it will be around afternoon. I want you to intercept this ship, board it, break any resistance of the crew if necessary, and retrieve the cargo it is carrying. To my knowledge, the ship is crewed by ten to twelve people, only a handful of which should have any kind of combat experience.”

“Well, that sounds like a piece of cake”, Jack comments, earning a frown from Johnson. He raises his mug and shrugs. “For the record, that means I’m worried.”

Lena silently agrees with him, but decides against addressing the issue right now. “The _Rua Elan_ is a gunboat, we don’t have the capacity to carry greater amounts of cargo.”

“That won’t be problem. The target is a simple box, possibly made of metal. It weighs around one hundred and eighty pounds, but I’m not sure about the exact measurements. Though, it shouldn’t be larger than a big standard cargo crate.”

“Sounds manageable”, Lena hums. “I want know more about this ship. Where is it coming from, where does it go and who owns it?”

“Where it’s coming from and its destination are of no interest to you, as well as the owner.”

“Wrong”, Sam chimes in, “we’re _very_ interested in these things.”

“I’m sorry to hear that”, Johnson replies, unimpressed.

“Origin and destination are one thing”, Lena elaborates. “But I run a small operation, and while I’ve got no problem with the illegal side of the business, I’m not inclined to piss off any major navy or government.”

“The target ship has no connection to any governmental organization or the military, that much I can say”, Johnsons insists. “I hope you’ve got no problems with pissing off some private company, though.”

“That depends”, Sam remarks. “Some companies have more firepower than a small army. Which one are we talking about?”

“There are no connections to any major companies.”

“That’s what _you’re_ saying.”

“You have to trust me on that.”

“Why?”

Lena calmly raises a hand to interrupt the argument. “Because Miss Johnson has to be as much invested in the success of her mission as we are.” She gives the other woman a piercing look. “I’m sure she wouldn’t compromise this operation by withholding vital information, am I right?”

Johnson returns Lena’s gaze unwavering. “Absolutely.”

Lena takes a moment to search the other woman’s eyes. While there surely are numerous things she is not telling them, in that moment she seems completely sincere. “Fine, I’ll take your word for it.”

Sam huffs quietly, but leans back in her chair, crossing her arms.

After a moment of silence, Johnson raises her eyebrows. “So, how much will this cost me?”

“Eight hundred Metropolitan pounds”, Lena replies immediately, having already calculated a price while Johnson was still speaking. “The first half we get now, the rest after the mission.”

“Five hundred and eighty”, Johnson states instantly. “And that’s non-negotiable.”

“In that case, we might have a problem.”

“It’s all I have”, Johnsons answers bluntly. “No demand on your part will change that.”

Lena raises an eyebrow, surprised by the other woman’s honesty. “You really don’t have some … emergency fund stashed away somewhere?”

“No. Everything I own besides that I’m wearing right now.” Involuntarily, Lena’s gaze dips to a thin gold chain Johnson carries around her neck, and the redhead snorts dismissively. “Yeah, don’t even think about that.” She rummages around in her backpack and after a couple of seconds produces an envelope she puts on the table. “The money’s in here. You can have it right now, but that’s all I can offer.”

Carefully, Lena takes the envelope and looks inside. At first glance, the sum seems to match what Johnson promised. “You must really want that cargo.”

“It’s very valuable to me.”

Lena exchanges a quick look with Jack and Sam, who nods slightly. After another beat of silence, she hands the envelope over to Sam. “Alright, we’ve got a deal. But I need to know if the cargo itself poses any dangers we should be aware of. Is it, for example, flammable or explosive?”

Even though she displays remarkable self control, Johnson seems relieved to hear that. “Nothing of the sort. But you have to handle it with care.” Something flickers behind Johnson’s eyes, too fast for Lena to identify it. “It might be … quite delicate.”

Lena shoots Sam a quick glance and makes a mental note to maybe revisit this later. “Understood.” She glances at her own wrist watch. “Considering the distance to the target area and the time we need to arrive there, it’s necessary to take off quite early in the morning. I want to have enough time to scout the area and acquire the best possible position for the attack. Do you want to bunk on our ship? We would be happy to cede one of our spare cabins.”

“I actually hoped that would be possible”, Johnson admits. “I don’t have a room for the night.”

“Then it’s settled.” Lena extends her hand and waits for the other woman to accept. “You won’t regret hiring us.”


	3. Interlude - Miss Johnson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few words about Miss Johnson.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm almost ashamed to give so few words their own chapter, but thematically and POV-wise it doesn't fit anywhere else. The least I can do, is to post it right away. :-)

Mary Johnson is a lot of things.

She is one among many, a woman in her twenties with a name she shares with millions in the Federation alone, able to dissolve into a faceless crowd. A nobody no one would ever miss.

She is a liar, a fighter – and a killer. She has killed often enough to stop thinking it could ever be justified.

She is ruthless, loyal only to her own cause. Time and death have long drowned out anything besides that.

She is a coward, willing to sacrifice her family, her morals, her ability to sleep and dream, all in fear of a future she is too afraid to face.

She is self-destructive, marching on towards her goal knowing all along it might destroy her even if she made it the end.

She is only five years old. She doesn’t want to get any older.

So when she arrives at the airport, at a small landing pad far off of the berths of the big freighters, she is relieved. Maybe, this is it. The last step of Mary Johnson’s voyage, one final leap of faith. Because in the end, that’s what it is. After this, there’s nothing left, no resources, no contacts, no tricks up her sleeve. Just a steely determination to soldier on even if it kills herself and everyone around her.

The airship that sits in its docking cradle on the landing pad is a good start. It’s a sleek gunboat, probably old, but well maintained by the looks of it and painted in a dull grey. Its flattened, oval-shaped hull is about a hundred feet long, with two bulky gondolas and a low, streamlined superstructure on the upper hull where the bridge has to be located. There’s two machine gun turrets on the upper hull, a ball turret on the belly, and she can see the gun port of a broadside-mounted cannon.

 _Yes, maybe that’s it_ , she thinks when she follows captain Kieran and her people to the gangway, trailing a little bit behind. A good ship and people who at least seem to know what they’re doing. That’s more than she can say of herself. For a last-ditch effort, she could do way worse.

Mary Johnson is a lot of things.

But first and foremost, she is alone. She can’t wait for it to finally end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The structure of this chapter is inspired by the following chapter of this work right here:  
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/16832944/chapters/39546286  
> It's meant as an homage, and I don't want to take any credit for that. If you haven't read this fic yet, DO IT, it's awesome!


	4. Paranoia Midnight Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam tries to learn more about Miss Johnson ... and might be a little paranoid while doing so.

Sam began to notice little things about Miss Johnson the second she’s started showing her around the ship. How the other woman moves without hesitation, even on the gun deck with its especially low ceiling and through the narrow safety hatches. How she takes in her surroundings with precise, sharp glances, instead of looking around wide eyed like someone would who sees a gunboat for the first time. How her gaze lingers a second or two too long on inconspicuous, but critical systems for it to be pure coincidence. However, Sam decides to not bother Lena right now with her thoughts. As her captain’s second-in-command, paranoia might be her job, but she’s learned to not be an alarmist.

When they arrive on the main deck, right in front of the gun deck and past the steep stairs that lead up to the bridge, Sam opens the sliding door of one of the empty cabins.

“After you”, she says with an overly grand gesture.

They enter the cramped room, which isn’t much more than a glorified closet pressed against the ship’s hull. There’s a locker right next to the door, two narrow bunks and a collapsible table on the wall opposite of them. Even with the table folded up, only a three feet wide strip of free space remains to move along the length of the cabin.

“It’s certainly much more confined than on a passenger ship or a freighter”, Sam says. “You’ve ever been aboard a combat craft before?”

“No.” Johnson puts her backpack on the upper bunk and automatically checks the stability of its mountings. Another one of these damn little things.

“At least you don’t have to share”, Sam continues. “One of the perks of being understaffed.”

“To be frank”, Johnson turns around and hooks her thumbs into her belt, “I didn’t expect your crew to be that small.”

“People are expensive.” Sam shrugs. “There aren’t many folks around who’d work for nutrient paste, coffee substitute and free lodging.”

“So things aren’t going very well?”

Sam takes a moment to consider what and how much she wants to say. “It’s not just the people you have to pay. You need fuel, lifting gas, food, water to drink and shower … add to that the occasional repair, and there’s not much left for additional hands. But”, Sam raises a finger, “we’re still in it. That’s what counts.”

Johnson looks like she wants to ask further questions, and Sam thinks she sees a brief flicker of insecurity behind the other woman’s eyes. But then she settles on: “How do you even operate a ship like this with only four people? I mean, you would need at least, what, five or six to man all the weapons alone.”

“We have to pick our engagements carefully, that’s true”, Sam admits. “But on the other hand, getting your ship shot to pieces is a pretty sure way to ruin yourself. If we get attacked by another gunboat or a couple of fighters, we _really_ fucked up before that. Not to mention, anything the scale of a fleet destroyer or bigger would blow us out of the sky without breaking a sweat.”

“So you only attack the helpless, is what you’re saying”, Johnson deadpans.

“And the sick, elderly, and maimed … we’re very inclusive”, Sam shoots back.

“You’re shitting me.”

“Obviously.”

Johnson huffs a humorless laugh. “What do you do when you meet resistance on a job? Turn tail and run?”

“We like to call it a ‘tactical retreat’.”

“Maybe I should’ve asked that before hiring you”, Johnson mumbles.

For a fraction of a second, Sam narrows her eyes. When she speaks, her tone is as light as before. “Well, it’s good that we go up against an unarmed freighter, then. That’s right up our alley.”

“My thoughts exactly”, Johnson replies without missing a beat, maybe a little too quick for Sam’s liking.

They share a moment of uneasy silence, then Johnson clears her throat. “It’s getting really late. I’ll just hit the sack, if that’s okay with you.”

“Sure. If you need anything, my cabin’s two doors down on the right.”

“Thanks.”

Sam holds Johnson’s gaze for a moment, then gives her a curt nod. “Have a good night.”

“Yeah. You too.”

Sam steps out of the cabin and closes the sliding door behind her. She takes a resigned breath, before going into the mess to brew a nice pot of strong, disgusting coffee substitute. It’s going to be a _long_ night.

*** * ***

The _Rua Elan’_ s mess is a lot bigger than the cabins, but no less confined. Most of the walls are lined with cupboards that contain dishes, cutlery, some games, and – most importantly – the liquor stash. The back right corner is dominated by a table in front of a corner bench and a couple of chairs. A door to the left leads to a tiny wet room, and the rest of the left wall is occupied by a bulky supply cabinet and a small kitchen unit. At this time, around four in the morning, the ship is at its quietest. The mess is only dimly lit by a single light above the table, the corridor outside remains dark aside from the dark-red glow of the night light. The only prominent sound is Mike’s dedicated snoring that echoes through the main deck.

Sam sits on a chair at the table, nursing a steaming cup of pitch-black coffee substitute, when she finally hears a faint noise in the corridor. A heartbeat later, Miss Johnson enters the mess, emerging from the gloom of the corridor like a ghost. The redhead is really sneaky, Sam has to give her that, her steps making almost no sound on the metal deck even though she’s wearing sturdy shoes. But Sam is no slouch in that department, either, and she also has damn good ears.

She glances up from her tin mug to greet the other woman, but is stopped dead in her tracks. Aside from her shoes, Johnson wears nothing but shorts and a tank top, showing off toned legs, arms and shoulders. A range of faint scars covers her body, the type you get from years worth of fighting people who try to stab you with sharp and pointy objects. There’s even a couple that Sam swears stem from at least grazing shots. And a particularly nasty one that runs from Johnson’s collarbone over her chest, until it vanishes below the hem of her top. None of the scars seem to be older than a couple of years.

Far too late, Sam tears her gaze away. “Good morning.”

“Is it even morning already?”

“Morning’s after sleeping, no matter the time”, Sam states and gestures Johnson to enter and take a seat. The redhead heavily slumps onto a chair, the scarce lighting of the ceiling light emphasizing the dark shadows around her eyes. Sam rises her eyebrows. “ _Did_ you sleep?”

“Like a baby.”

“Babies wake up every couple of hours and cry.”

“Really?” Johnson twists her mouth sideways as if in deep thought. “Huh.”

Sam feels a stab of sympathy she instantly tries to suppress. Whoever Johnson might be as a person and whatever might have happened to her, one thing is certain: She’s not a woman someone should let their guard down when around her.

“Coffee?”, Sam asks.

Obviously surprised by the sudden offer, Johnson focuses on her. “Yes, please.”

Sam stands up and gets another tin mug that she fills with the still steaming liquid. “How do you drink it?” She gestures vaguely towards the kitchen unit. “We have sugar substitute and powdered milk here somewhere, although Jack’s the only one who uses it.”

“Black’s just fine, thanks.”

Sam nods an slides the mug over to Johnson, who accepts it gratefully. Then, she crosses over to the supply cabinet. “I was about to get some breakfast. You hungry too?”

“I don’t know.” Johnson takes a sip from her mug and doesn’t even flinch. Not a lot of people manage that when tasting Sam’s coffee for the first time. “What do you have?”

Sam quirks an eyebrow. “Let’s see …” She starts digging around in the cabinet and sifts through the different cans of nutrient paste that are stored there. “We have blue mush, green mush, grey mush, and _oh_ … yellow mush. That one’s my favorite, way better than the others.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure. Still tastes like shit, but with a certain …”, Sam shakes her free hand, “ _exotic_ air to it.” She looks at Johnson expectantly. “What’s it gonna be?”

“I’ll have whatever you’re having.”

“Yellow mush it is …”

Sam takes two tin bowls, opens the can and splits the mush as equally as possible. It hits the surface of the bowls with an oozy sound most people in more civilized areas of the world would probably find rather disgusting. She then gets spoons and sets one bowl on the table in front of Johnson.

“Enjoy”, she says overly cheerful before sitting down herself.

Johnson tries a spoonful and makes a show of moving it around in her mouth, feigning to be thoughtful. “I think I know what you meant, there’s definitely something different about it”, she states. “Tastes a bit like this sticky stuff you scrape from the hull of an ocean vessel.”

“Yeah, I’ve got taste, alright”, Sam retorts. “Not as good as Jack’s fashion sense, but I have my moments.” At that, Johnson seems to have to fight a smile.

“So …”, Sam drawls, after they’re a couple of spoons in, “cop or military?”

Johnson immediately tenses up, apparently surprised be the question. “Come again?”

“What did you do before you started hiring mercs to raid other airships?”, Sam elaborates. She can see the conscious effort the other woman makes to relax.

“Shouldn’t you start with something like ‘I don’t wanna pry, but …’? You know, to avoid appearing to be nosy.”

“Sure could, but I _am_ being nosy.”

Johnsons gives her a faint, lopsided grin. She puts her spoon into the bowl and leans back on her chair, pointedly looking at the two guns that Sam wears at her hips. “Pirate or smuggler?” When Sam looks at her questioningly, she shrugs. “What did you do before someone came along and offered you money to raid other airships?”

“Prey on the sick, elderly, and maimed, remember?”, Sam answers lightly.

“Yeah, that’s really dark, but also not very specific.”

“There’s not much we haven’t done at some point. In the right corner of the world, you can wear a _lot_ of hats when you got a boat with a kick-ass gun.” Sam points her spoon at Johnson. “That wasn’t a very good dodge, by the way. You can do better.”

Johnson snorts and crosses her arms. “Why do you think cop or military?”

“I just get certain vibes from you.”

Johnson ponders her next words. In a movement that has to be unconscious, she touches whatever is attached to the golden chain she wears around her neck. Through the fabric of the tank top, Sam can only tell that it’s something flat and round, maybe a small medallion or a ring.

“Well … I was both”, Johnson says in the end, and Sam is surprised that she appears to tell the truth. “I was a military cop.”

Her honesty catches Sam off-guard. “Wow, you must’ve been a _really_ popular girl.”

“You have no idea.”

A beat of heavy silence hangs between them before Sam speaks again. “Did you like it?”

Johnson’s eyes focus on something far away from this room, the _Rua Elan_ , and even Port Eddington. “I loved it, actually.” An almost melancholic smile flits across her lips. “Which only further increased my popularity, by the way. A … friend of mine said it would ‘correspond well with my dictatorial tendencies’. Whatever that means …”

“It means, you like bossing people around”, Sam says helpfully.

“No shit.” Johnson looks at her as if she can’t decide if Sam has been serious. “That was a joke, with … with the dictatorial tendencies. I was kidding.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

Johnson scoffs lightly and rolls her eyes at that. For some reason, it looks like she has to remember which muscles to use for the movement.

“So, what happened?”, Sam asks.

“I had to leave.” Johnson looks down, absentmindedly playing with her spoon. “Something important came up.”

“I get it.” Sam nods slowly. “Life can be a real asshole.”

“You can say that again …”

They don’t talk more after that, though now the silence is almost comfortable. Sam finishes her breakfast first, and when Johnson insists she’ll eat up the rest of her mush, Sam quickly rinses out her bowl. She turns to leave the mess, but abruptly stops in the doorway.

“Stripper”, she says, without really knowing why.

Johnson’s gaze snaps up. “Sorry, what?”

“What I did before I started smuggling, or raiding helpless airships and the like.”

Suspicious, Johnson narrows her eyes. “You’re kidding.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Sam winks at her and leaves before the other woman can say anything else.

She makes it only a couple of steps before she feels the sudden urge to bang her head against the solid frame of the next safety hatch. _What the fuck are you doing, Arias?_

She can’t help but feel a pang of sadness. Johnson seems like she could be a decent person, though probably quite damaged by whatever happened to her. She might even have a good sense of humor – she _definitely_ has great legs. It’s a damn shame chances are good she’s also a lying, nasty piece of work.


	5. Jack-in-the-Box

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And the plot starts moving!
> 
> (By the way, I found a nice theme song when I had my music running when writing. Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1IVZpk_rVo )

**Southern Fringe**

**Approximately 600 miles from Port Eddington**

**Early Afternoon**

When you look at it on a map, the Southern Fringe is basically an enormous chain of islands, stretching in a wide arc from the icy waters of the South Pole to the hot regions just south of the equator. It is a paradise of blue seas, white beaches, schools of colorful fish and beautiful coral reefs. A paradise infested by pirates, smugglers, mercenaries and warlords – with the occasional volcano sprinkled in for good measure – but a paradise nonetheless.

This afternoon, the sky is a perfect blue with not a single cloud in sight, which is good and bad at the same time. On one hand, it means an airship can be spotted from many miles away, which limits the chance that the freighter can slip past them by coincidence. On the other hand, said ship will be able to see any attacker just as early and could make a break for it, call for assistance while running away just long enough for help to arrive.

That is why Lena decided to anchor at a small island roughly in the center of the area that, at least according to Miss Johnson, their target will cross through. It is as perfect a position as one can hope for, with a few patches of palm trees and two surprisingly high rising hills that provide excellent cover for the _Rua Elan_ ’s low profile, while providing good vantage points for Lena’s crew. With a little luck, they will manage to spot the freighter much earlier than its crew will detect them in return.

Of course, as always in life, this comes with certain disadvantages; one of which sees Lena now climbing the western hill, cursing in her mind, because she simply is too winded to do it out loud. She has never been the most physically fit, openly admits that she hates working out, but walking up a hill should not be this hard – hot air and burning sun notwithstanding. Maybe she should start sparring with Sam again, that would at least be something akin to fun. She huffs and lifts her Fedora to wipe the sweat off her brow, well aware that she probably looks rather ridiculous. Her usual clothes she wears aboard – dark working pants and shoes, and a loose, bleached-out black shirt, as well as her belt with revolver and cutlass – do not exactly go well with the broad-brimmed hat. But then again, seizing an airship while having a sunburn and looking like an overripe tomato is not an option, either. Some things you just have to do in style.

Sweating and out of breath, she finally reaches the top of the hill. There she finds Sam sitting out in the open, looking through a binocular, and seemingly unfazed by the burning afternoon sun. The legs of her workpants are rolled up above the knees, and she has her shirt slung around the waist, leaving her with only a sweat-stained, grey tank top.

“I seriously hope you’re still on watch and not only sunbathing”, Lena remarks when Sam doesn’t react to her arrival.

Sam turns around and squints up to her captain, shielding her eyes with a hand. “Please, Cap, I’m a professional. Though a little more free time to enjoy the sun couldn’t hurt once in a while.”

“I’ll keep that in mind”, Lena drawls. “The next crimes I plan will all be committed after sundown, so you can enjoy your time off during the day. Captain’s honor.”

“Uh-huh.”

Lena moves next to Sam, tucks her cutlass out of the way and sits down. The bare rock is almost uncomfortably hot through the fabric of her pants. “Mike said you wanted to see me.”

“Yeah.” Sam nodded, her brows knitted together. “It’s about Miss Johnson.”

“What about her?”

“She’s lying.” When Lena wants to comment, Sam quickly raises a hand. “I know, we all are. But I think she might be lying about the job. And she’s definitely been on an airship before.”

“What makes you think that? The lying about the job part, I mean.”

“Not that I can prove anything.” Sam gestures vaguely. “But she seemed a little stressed out that we’re only a few people and don’t do frontal assaults. What do we do if this freighter isn’t as defenseless as she lets on?”

“Then we pull out”, Lena states immediately. “For five hundred and sixty pounds I wouldn’t risk a hard fight.”

“I don’t think she’d take kindly to that”, Sam points out, clearly worried. “And you might be alone with her when you break the news.”

“In that case, I’ll deal with it.”

“Lena …”

“I know she’s dangerous, Sam”, Lena interrupts her friend. “She has killed, certainly more than just a couple of times. But that applies to a lot of people we work with. Thank you for the warning, but for now I’ll give our employer the benefit of the doubt.” Sam looks quite unsatisfied with her answer, and Lena puts a hand on her forearm. “I’ll be on my guard. I promise.”

For a few seconds, Sam worries her bottom lip. “You’re right, she’s dangerous. But I think it’s actually worse.” When Lena questioningly raises an eyebrow, she shrugs. “I think she’s desperate.”

A piercing whistle cuts through the hot air before Lena can respond. She turns around and sees Mike at his lookout on the other hill, waving his arms frantically and pointing roughly to the North.

“They’re here.” Lena jumps to her feet and offers Sam a hand. “Let’s go.”

*** * ***

Lena is the last to enter the _Rua Elan_ , making sure everybody else is already aboard. Without even thinking about it, she hauls the rope ladder in, slams the hatch shut and locks it with the big hand wheel. After years of experience, the movements have become second nature to her – as has the command mode in which she easily slips into. “Jack, fire up the engines, then take the aft machine gun turret. Sam, Mike, you take the main gun. Miss Johnson, you’re with me.”

She doesn’t wait for confirmation, doesn’t have to, because she is certain Sam and Jack know the drill and will carry out her orders without fail. Mike will have no chance but to follow suit. So, she makes a bolt for the bridge, grabbing the handle above the safety hatches of the gun deck and catapulting herself through the low frames feet first, barely slowing down her dash. When she reaches the top of the narrow stairs to the bridge, she realizes that Miss Johnson has somehow managed to keep up with her. If Lena had doubted Sam’s assessments before, this fact alone would have proven her friend right. This was not Johnson’s first rodeo aboard an airship. Lena takes the information for what it is and files it away for later. Right now, she has no opportunity to think about it.

At the time she finally reaches the helm console, the _Rua Elan_ ’s engines come alive with a deep buzz, sending soothing vibrations through the deck beneath Lean’s feet, when the big propellers start turning in their armored gondolas. She flicks the necessary switches and hits the button that rolls up the mooring lines. Then she floods the aerium tanks, causing the ship to rise sharply, while at the same time pushing the throttle forward. The sound of the engines increases to a roar, and the _Rua Elan_ jumps forward, swiftly following Lena’s movements of the control levers as she points her ship towards the dark dot on the horizon. Behind her, Johnson curses because of the sudden maneuvers, but stays on her feet nonetheless and closes the hatch.

“Don’t be alarmed”, Lena says when she hits the button that will engage the final stage of the combat mode on the bridge. Armored shudders slam in front of the bridge windows, protecting the vulnerable glass except for a narrow slip and shutting out the bright daylight. Simultaneously, the red night light flares up and immerses the bridge in a dangerous, dark-red glow.

The first moment of calm since they sighted their target hits Lena like a bucket of cold water. She is still focused, the adrenaline still shooting through her veins like a drug, but now she can feel her rapid heartbeat, feel her heavy breathing. She wills herself to slow down and reach the cool, calculating state she will need for the upcoming operation.

“What, um …”, Johnson starts. When Lena looks at her, the other woman seems tense but calm, albeit a little bit at a loss. “What shall I do?”

Lena indicates to a row of hooks at the back wall of the bridge the crew uses to hang up gear, jackets, headgear, and the like. At the moment, the hooks are empty except for a set of strong binoculars.

“Take one of the binoculars and keep me updated about the target.” The sight of hooks remembers Lena that she is still wearing her Fedora, and she drops it unceremoniously on the deck next to the helm console. “Can you operate a radio or know Morse code?”

“Both.”

“Excellent. Then, if everything goes well”, Lena gives her a sly smile, “you can demand their unconditional surrender.”

The next minutes, after Lena has gotten the all-clear from Sam and Jack, pass agonizingly slowly while they steadily close the distance to their target. As far as Lena can tell, the other ship is currently steering a course at a thirty degree angle to their own, causing the _Rua Elan_ to approach it from portside forward. Lena picks up her own binoculars from a compartment in the side of the helm console. They are still too far away to perceive any real details on their target. It is a bulky ship with two gondolas, presumably not much longer than the _Rua Elan_ , but easily twice as wide and high. A light freighter, just as Miss Johnson said – and it does not even try to change course, as if the crew has not yet spotted the dark silhouette of the approaching gunboat against a clear sky.

_What’s going on with these people? Are they sleeping?_

Another thirty seconds pass with the freighter stubbornly holding its course.

 _Alright, let’s give them a little wake-up call_. Lena picks up the microphone of the intercom that is installed on the helm console and presses the button for the gun deck. “Sam, load flak grenade for a warning shot. Don’t open the gun port yet.”

“Aye, Cap”, Sam’s voice crackles out of the bridge loudspeakers, quickly followed by: “Main gun loaded and ready to fire.”

Moments later, the loudspeaker of the radio in the adjacent radio room suddenly comes alive. “Unidentified gunboat, this is the Metropolitan freighter _Kerryann_. Identify yourself and state your intentions.”

 _Here we go_ , Lena thinks, unable to suppress a private smirk. _The game is on._ She continues to close in on her target and ignores the message. Like the _Kerryann_ , she would have to use the Open Frequency, an open, unsecured channel that everyone in range can listen in to. She will neither identify her ship, nor state her intention to board the freighter for everyone to hear up until the last possible moment.

In the meantime, the _Kerryann_ starts maneuvering, but curiously not in an attempt to evade the _Rua Elan_. Instead, it roughly maintains its current course, using its steering propellers to keep its bow pointed straight at the gunboat. Lena frowns. The freighter’s movements make sense insofar that it presents the smallest possible target, but the distance between the ships continues to shrink rapidly. Maybe the other captain thinks he can pass his attacker at maximum speed, making an aimed shot against his ship almost impossible and then buying time, because the _Rua Elan_ needs to turn around before she can give chase again. But surely, he would know that the gunboat is far too fast and maneuverable for that tactic to save his ship.

“Miss Johnson, can you spot any more details?”, Lena asks.

The other woman peers through her binoculars. “No, they’re still oriented right towards us. I can see the bow and the superstructure with bridge, but that’s it.” She scoffs. “Those guys are crazy if they think they can outmaneuver your boat.” From the corner of her eyes, Lena can see her smile. It is a cold, predatory expression. “Now, they’ll never get away.”

Behind them, the radio pipes up again. “Unidentified gunboat, this is the Metropolitan freighter _Kerryann_. Be warned that our crew is armed and ready to repel any attempts to board and seize this ship.”

 _They’re not even trying to call for assistance._ Lena thoughtfully purses her lips. Every airship is legally bound to monitor the Open Frequency at all times specifically to make sure that distress calls can be picked up no matter the nationality of the sending ship. If the _Kerryann_ had called for help, the _Rua Elan_ ‘s radio would have picked up the message. And that can only mean one thing: The freighter does _not want_ help. But why? Could their cargo cause more problems if it was discovered than if the ship was raided by pirates? However, that in itself does not necessarily mean anything. All kinds of cargo could –

“Are we going to answer them?”, Johnson’s voice pulls Lena back to the here and now.

“Non-verbally, yes.” Lena picks up her mic again. “Sam, open the portside gun port and run out the barrel.” She banks the _Rua Elan_ to starboard, facing the freighter with her broadside. “Aim for shot across the bow.”

The bridge speaker crackles alive. “Ready.”

“Fire.”

A harsh crack sounds when the 2-inch-gun fires, muffled through the deck below and two safety hatches, but still loud. A heartbeat later a puff of black smoke appears in front of the _Kerryann_ ’s bow, far enough away to avoid any real damage, but certainly close enough to shower the freighter’s hull with a hail of sharp metal splinters. For a few tense seconds, nothing happens, then the other ship slows down. It does not stop right away, but decelerates and drifts, presumably because someone cut the engines. The _Kerryann_ ’s crew strikes the Metropolitan Federation’s flag that flies from the flagpole at the stern and replaces it with a plain white cloth.

Automatically, Lena presses the speak button on her mic again. “Sam, you and Mike take the harpoons. They just surrendered.”

“Aye, Cap.”

Lena looks at Johnson and jerks her head towards the radio room. “Miss Johnson, if you would be so kind?”

Johnson nods curtly and turns away, her jaw now set and a fire in her eyes that is only emphasized by the dark-red light. Where this sudden anger comes from, Lena cannot tell, and that gets her hackles up. So far, everything is going smoothly. Whatever the reason might be, Lena does not want somebody at her back who goes into a fight in a mood like that. She ponders if she should even take their employer aboard the _Kerryann_.

“Metropolitan freighter _Kerryann_ , prepare to be boarded.” Johnson’s voice is flat and hard enough to cut diamonds. “Be advised: Resistance of any kind will be answered with deadly force.”

 _Scratch that_ , Lena decides when she hears the panicked ‘affirmative’ of the freighter’s radio operator. _She_ definitely _stays behind_.

“A little dramatic, don’t you think?”, Lena remarks when Johnson returns to the bridge window.

The other woman does not even look at her. “Not if it’s true.” She radiates a barely suppressed rage that is almost palpable.

Lena swallows involuntarily. Remembering her conversation with Sam, she refrains from saying anything more for now. She intends to have a talk with Johnson before they board the _Kerryann_ , but Sam might have been right. She should not do it without backup.

Determinedly, she shakes off her worries and turns back to the bridge window. Meanwhile, the freighter has used its steering propellers to fully stop and turn around, presenting the _Rua Elan_ its stern. It’s a smart move that allows its attackers to board more easily, thereby limiting the damage done by the grappling harpoons Lena’s crew will use to tie both ships together. It also is another sign of their willingness to cooperate. Still, something about the whole situation rubs Lena the wrong way, although she cannot put her finger on it. Maybe she is just paranoid – or Miss Johnson’s now unsettling presence is getting to her.

Lena shoves all that aside and concentrates on her controls. She slows her ship down and adds some height, gaining an elevated position to the freighter they will need to bring the grappling harpoons in the _Rua Elan_ ’s belly to bear. The whole time, the _Kerryann_ is lying perfectly still, aside from a slight drift caused by the wind, like a dead fish in the water. Though, the uneasy feeling in Lena’s gut intensifies. _What’s wrong, what’s wrong, what’s wrong …?_ , she chants in her head, while examining the other ship over and over again.

And then it happens. Maybe a little more distracted than she should be, Lena lets the _Rua Elan_ drift to starboard. It is not much, but the freighter instantly compensates with its aft steering propeller to keep its stern pointed directly at them.

A sudden realization shoots a chill down Lena’s spine. _Son of a –_

The _Kerryanne_ floods its aerium tanks, causing it to climb abruptly. At the same moment, the walls of the rear part of the freighter’s superstructure, right behind the bridge, fold down – and there it sits, like an armed and armored jack-in-the-box: A low gun turret, its cannon still in travel position, but nonetheless almost perfectly lined up for a shot up the _Rua Elan_ ’s bow.

Lena’s body reacts before her thoughts even have a chance to catch up. “Hold on!”, she yells, simultaneously ramming the throttle of the portside gondola forward and flipping a switch to vent the aerium tanks. The lifting gas escapes with a sharp hiss, almost drowned out by the roar of the engines. The _Rua Elan_ sharply drops, while violently lunging and banking to starboard.

Somewhere behind them, the turret opens fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there I missed my plan to update at least once a week already on the 5th chapter ...  
> Sorry for that! Life got in the way, as it often does (by being an asshole, Sam was right in the previous chapter) but I hope I can write more consistently again.
> 
> In any case, thanks for reading! :-)


	6. Piece of Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Action! Drama! Conflict! ... Answers?

**Gunboat _Rua Elan_**

**Southern Fringe**

**Approximately 600 miles from Port Eddington**

**Early Afternoon**

Lena hears the metallic bang that rings through her ship even over the roar of the engines, knows they took a shell that somehow bounced off the armor, but does not allow herself to think about it. Instead, she pulls the _Rua Elan_ through a series of hard turns, using the rudders and the steering propellers alike, all the while hoping that no one gets hurt. She simply does not have the time to warn Sam and Mike on the gun deck. Johnson stumbles and curses, but manages to grab the frame of the safety hatch and stays on her feet. Behind them, Lena can hear the dry crack of the _Kerryann_ ’s gun, one, two, three times in rapid succession. Whoever operates the weapon is well trained, reloading and firing at maximum speed, and they know how to aim if the glancing hit was not a fluke. In mid-air, it is impossible to see where the projectiles go and by how far they miss her ship, but Lena does not intend to stick around long enough to find out if their luck runs out.

When Lena is sure that they put a reasonably safe distance between them and the freighter, she levels the _Rua Elan_ out and pulls the throttle back to eighty percent. Then, she picks up her mic and calls Jack in the aft machine gun turret. “What’s it doing, Jack?”

“Steering clear, they’re trying to get away.”

“Keep an eye on them.” When another channel of the intercom flashes an urging red light at her, Lena flips a switch. “Bridge.”

“What the hell was that?”, Sam snaps, sounding more worried than angry.

“Hidden turret”, Lena answers curtly. “Are you and Mike alright?”

“Yeah, we’re fine, nothing but a couple of bruises. Luckily, we were done reloading.”

Lena exhales and allows herself a brief moment of relief. “Alright, run in the barrel and close the gun port. You and Mike, get up to the bridge ASAP.”

“Aye, Cap.”

Lena puts the mic back onto the helm console and pretends to focus on her controls. She remembers how she told Sam she would deal with Johnson if the woman would react badly to the news that the mission was a bust. Now, she might just have to, and seeing how Johnson threatened to break any resistance onboard the _Kerryann_ with lethal force, this may not go terribly well.

 _We were a little cocky there, weren’t we?_ , she thinks when she can feel Johnson move behind her and to her right. Indeed, it might be best to drag this conversation out until Sam arrives with Mike.

“Wait, aren’t you going to turn around?”, Johnson asks.

Lena makes a show of flicking some unimportant switches, then slowly turns to face her employer. When she speaks, her voice is absolutely calm. “The turret had its gun firmly trained on us, and we were too close to fight back. We need to reach a safe distance.”

“I think you did. So, why are we still running?”

Lena observes the hard expression on Johnson’s face. The woman still is tense, there still is a remnant of the anger she showed towards the _Kerryann_ ’s crew when she demanded their surrender. But there also is something else lurking in those dark-brown eyes, though Lena cannot tell what it is. Sam, however, could.

 _Desperation._ Once again, Lena does not respond right away, trying to buy more time.

“Hey, you gonna answer me or not?”, Johnson snaps impatiently.

Involuntarily, Lena straightens herself, trying to appear taller than she is. “I’m pulling out.”

For a moment, Johnson just stands there, stunned. “You’re quitting?”

“I’m retreating.”

“I fail to see the difference”, Johnson growls and steps closer.

Against her better judgment, Lena stands her ground. She knows her way around a gun and can at least defend herself in a brawl, but she has no doubt that Johnson is the better fighter. So, she keeps stalling. “In case you didn’t notice, we were hit by a ship-to-ship grenade. By sheer luck, it bounced off the armor or was a dud.” She indicates towards the bridge window. “That turret is armed with a two-inch, maybe three-inch gun. The former our armor can take, the latter will punch right through if it lands a solid hit. And the closer we get, the better are the chances of exactly that happening. That’s not a risk I’m willing to take.”

“We had a deal”, Johnson bites out.

“Which I will honor by returning the full amount you paid us in advance.”

“I don’t give a damn about the money!”, Johnson flares up. “I _need_ this cargo.”

“For the sake of my ship and crew, I can’t carry on.”

“Then you’re shit out of luck.” Johnson comes even closer until she towers over Lena, staring down at her. “Because you will have to.”

*** * ***

Sam can hear Johnson yell even through the armor steel of the safety hatch. “I _need_ this cargo.”

 _Fuck._ She takes the last three steps of the stairs in one leap.

“Damn”, Mike quips behind her, “someone’s got a temper.”

“Just be ready for anything”, Sam replies, grabs the hand wheel and opens the hatch. When she enters the bridge, she sees Lena and Johnson standing in front of the helm console, only inches apart. The tension between the women is almost tangible. But as soon as Sam fully steps into the confined room, Johnson slowly backs away from Lena, yet still remaining at arm’s length. Her posture reminds Sam of a cornered animal.

“Phew, that was nasty surprise”, Sam says, feigning levity and probably failing miserably at it. When neither of the other two women react, she covertly signals Mike to move to the entrance of the radio room – almost in Johnson’s back – and closes the hatch. Johnson follows his movements with narrowed eyes, immediately shifting her stance to keep him in front of her.

“Is there a problem?”, Sam asks as calmly as possible.

“I informed Miss Johnson that I don’t intend to attempt another attack”, Lena replies lowly. “We merely disagree if our contract includes outright ship-to-ship combat, which I’m convinced it does not.”

“Breaking resistance is the reason I needed a damned gunboat in the first place”, Johnson shoots back.

“But you told us the freighter would be unarmed”, Sam reminds her. “Surely, you didn’t intentionally hide from us that the ship has a gun turret. Right?”

“Personally, I’m game for a real fight”, Mike chimes in before Johnson can answer. “But shooting grenades at each other is pretty expensive, you know? ‘Cause of the hazard bonus and stuff.”

“If you want more money, I already told you that I’ve got nothing left. Only this.” Johnson takes the gold chain she wears around her neck and pulls a small, golden locket out from under her shirt. “This is real gold. Get me the cargo, and you can have it.”

“I was under the impression this trinket is very dear to you”, Lena remarks.

“Right now, I don’t care about that.”

Sam sees how Lena takes a deep breath, obviously trying to further deescalate the situation, and relaxes somewhat.

“Miss Johnson, I assure you I’m not being greedy”, Lena says quietly. “The simple fact is, if we take more than one serious hit, the money you pay us will never cover the repair costs. And your locket doesn’t make any difference, even if it is real gold. I’m sorry.”

There is a beat of heavy silence, and Sam shivers when Johnson’s face loses all expression. “I guess nothing I can say will convince you to go on.”

“I’m afraid so.”

Johnson moves ever so slightly, and Sam tenses up, her fingers twitching nervously at her side in the instinct to go for her gun.

Johnson’s eyes snap up to meet hers. “Shame you engineer isn’t around”, she states casually, _something_ shifts, and Sam feels her blood run cold. “He would’ve made for a great hostage.”

For the first time in a very long time, Sam is not fast enough. Johnson doesn’t attack them – she _explodes_ in a flurry of ruthless violence and unrestrained anger Sam has never seen in another person before. Lightning-fast, she strikes out and hits Sam in the chest, driving all the air from her lungs. Gasping, Sam stumbles back, when Johnson grabs the collar of Lena’s shirt and hurls her towards Sam. She goes down with Lena on top of her, hitting the deck hard and missing the frame of the chart room door by mere inches. Hastily, she pushes Lena aside and gets up just in time to see how Johnson hits Mike on the forehead with her binoculars. He groans in pain and staggers backwards against the bridge window. Sam manages to pull one of her pistols out of the holster, but Johnson spins around and lands a kick against her forearm. Her wrist goes numb and she loses her weapon, just as Johnson grabs her arm and flings her towards Mike, who’s struggling to regain his balance. Sam stumbles and uses Mike to steady herself, pushing the cursing man down. She whirls around and sees that Johnson has now turned her back on her, ready to attack Lena again who just got up. Desperately, Sam lunges at her, falls short, but manages to get a hold of Johnson’s ankle and pulls. The other woman loses her footing and goes down, screaming and kicking wildly. Due more to luck than skill, Sam avoids being hit square in the face, and wants to grapple with her opponent in earnest, when Johnson suddenly freezes. She looks up and sees Lena standing over them, her revolver aimed right between Johnson’s eyes.

“If you even _think_ about moving a single muscle”, Lena hisses, “it’ll be the last thing you do.”

Of course, Johnson tries anyway.

Later, Sam can’t for the life of her tell how she did it. Somehow, she hits Lena’s wrist right when the revolver goes off, while also slamming into Johnson’s upper body. The shot rings deafeningly loud on the confined bridge, the bullet goes wild and ricochets off of the deck with high pitched wail before burying itself in the doorframe of the chart room. However, now Sam has the upper hand. She pushes Johnson down, uses her weight to pin her opponent against the deck, and lands a hard blow at Johnson’s temple.

This time, it’s enough. The other woman grunts and goes limp, hitting the deck with a dull thud. For a moment, Sam kneels rooted on the spot, breathing heavily, her hands planted on the cold metal deck on either side of Johnson’s head. Everything is silent aside from the hum of the engines and Mike’s low, nasal cursing. Eventually, Sam looks up and gazes at Lena, whose face is a stiff, emotionless mask. But Sam knows her well enough to know that there’s a storm of anger and wrath brewing right under the controlled surface – against Johnson, but also directed at her. “Cap, I –”

“Not now. We will talk about his later.” Lena’s voice is uncannily calm and collected. To Sam, it’s far worse than if her captain, her _friend_ , would be yelling at her. “Take Mike and get her into her cabin. Keep an eye on her. And if she tries _anything_ – shoot her.” Lena pierces Sam with a cold gaze. “That’s an order.”

*** * ***

Getting Miss Johnson down the steep stairs on to the main deck isn’t an easy task. The woman is heavier than expected, her body – as far as Sam can tell from holding her under the armpits – only consisting of bones, tendons, and muscle. Mike, who carries the woman’s legs and has to climb down the stairs backwards, has it even harder. He also hasn’t yet gotten over how Johnson knocked him on his ass, and obviously would have loved to shoot her right then and there had Lena not ordered otherwise.

When they finally reach the foot of the stairs and enter the corridor, Sam hears quick steps approaching from the gun deck.

“I think we took a glancing hit somewhere on the starboard broadside”, Jack starts, although he’s not even in sight. “We need to slow down, so I can go outside and take a look at –” When enters the main deck, he stops dead, awkwardly crouched in the narrow hatch. “Uh … that’s not looking good.”

“No shit, Jack”, Mike grumbles. He tries to move on, but is forced to stop when Sam doesn’t follow suit.

“What happened?”, Jack asks.

“Lena decided to abort the mission.” Sam jerks her chin towards the unconscious woman in her arms. “She didn’t take it well.”

“Okay …” Jack nods slowly. “What are we going to do?”

“Throw her out the hatch, if you ask me”, Mike says.

Sam glares at him. “That’s for the captain to decide.” She turns to the engineer. “Go to the bridge, Lena can bring you up to speed. And would you mind opening that door?”

“Uh, sure.” Jack quickly opens the door to Johnson’s cabin and steps out of the way, before heading up to the bridge.

In the cabin, they lay Johnson on the bunk, Sam being far more careful than Mike, who practically throws the woman’s legs on to the thin mattress. Sam gives him a stern look, but doesn’t admonish him. He’s already developing an impressive bump on his forehead where Johnson hit him with the binoculars. “Can you bring me some water?”

“Sure.”

While she waits for Mike to return, Sam looks at Johnson. The read-headed woman seems a lot younger now, smaller too. But even while unconscious, her features are grim, a steep crease showing between her brows and angry wrinkles around her mouth.

 _How old might she be?_ In her mid to late twenties, at most, around the same age as Sam herself. Before she can follow this train of thought any further, Mike comes back and hands her a tin mug.

“Thanks.” Sam indicates towards the corridor. “Please wait outside and close the door behind you.”

“The captain said to keep an eye on her”, Mike objects.

“Which I will do.”

“What if she tries something again?”

“Then I’ll cry for help and you can kick the door in and save me. How does that sound?”

Sam can practically see the gears turning in Mike’s head until he eventually shrugs. “Okay, go knock yourself out.” He chuckles suddenly. “You know, actually that’s –”

“Yeah, awesome joke, pun-master”, Sam retorts and rolls her eyes. “Now, out you go.”

She waits until Mike closes the door before turning back to the unconscious woman. Lena likes to say that she’s all about second chances, but this time Sam isn’t sure there will _be_ a second chance. Lena’s patience and mercy end when her crew is concerned, and that’s one thing Sam so fiercely loves about her. But Sam can’t forget her talk with Johnson in the mess last night, and the feeling that she caught a brief glimpse at who the woman really is – the person behind the obviously false name and hardened facade, haunted by something in her past that finally pushed her over the edge today.

Sam takes a sip from the water Mike brought her, then nods to herself and throws the rest of the fluid directly in Johnson’s face. The woman shoots up yelping, thrashes around and automatically reaches for her hip, growing stiff when she finds her holster empty. For several heartbeats, she just sits there, then slowly raises her eyes to look at Sam.

“Guess I’m not dead”, she murmurs, her voice as empty as her dull, brown eyes.

Sam simply quirks an eyebrow, but keeps her hands close to her guns. “Disappointed?”

“Surprised.”

“Well, things can always change.”

Johnson doesn’t answer, but looks at her hands, without a doubt wondering why they aren’t tied.

“Yeah, don’t even bother”, Sam says coldly. “Unlike my friend Jack, I wouldn’t be a very good hostage.” When Johnson keeps looking down, Sam huffs. “What, you’re not even trying to apologize?”

“Would you believe me if I did?”

“Not for a second.”

“And rightfully so …”

Almost a full minute of heavy silence stretches between them. The whole time, Johnson stares at the deck in front of the bunk with unseeing eyes, looking utterly deflated. Something about it rubs Sam the wrong way, as if the woman opposite of her just isn’t built to experience defeat. However, Sam would never be foolish enough to think that Johnson might be harmless in this state.

“I got a question”, she begins again. “Let’s say, you somehow managed to incapacitate Mike and me, then knocked out the captain and got your hands on Jack. What was your plan after that?”

Johnson answers without hesitation. “I’d have tied you up, cut the engines, put your captain on a chair and lined the rest of you up in front of the nearest wall.” Her voice is unsettlingly calm, still bare of any emotions. “Then I’d have threatened to kill the crew one by one until your captain continues the mission – starting with this idiot Mike, ‘cause he’s obviously the most useless of you lot. And if me blowing his brains out hadn’t been convincing enough …”, she levels a dead gaze at Sam, “I’d have continued with you.”

For the first time, Sam believes every word that Johnson says. She swallows drily, regretting that she used all the water to wake Johnson up. “It would’ve been quite difficult to get your cargo with a gunship with no crew.”

Johnson shrugs. “I guess I’d have crossed that bridge when I got to it.”

“You would’ve failed.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Giving up or die trying to go on … it doesn’t make any difference.”

“Okay …”, Sam comments, dragging the word out. “And how exactly do you think all that helps them?”

“Who?”

“Whoever you’re doing this for.” It’s nothing more than an educated guess, but a subtle flicker of surprise in Johnson’s eyes tells Sam that she hit the mark. “Or are you on a personal vendetta and don’t have anything to lose anymore?”

“I have _everything_ to lose”, Johnson bursts out and gets ready to move. But this time, Sam is prepared for her ability to go on the offensive in the blink of an eye. She has her hand on her gun before Johnson has moved more than an inch. The other woman freezes, her eyes wide and her mouth pressed in a thin line, and Sam can see how she fights to rein in her temper. Very slowly, she settles back down, and Sam lets go of her pistol.

“You done?”, Sam asks.

Johnson nods ever so slightly, retreating to the corner of the bunk and pulling her knees up under her chin. The whole time, she makes sure that Sam can see her hands. “How did you know?”

Sam crosses her arms and leans back against the wall of the cabin, accepting Johnson’s display of peacefulness. “That look you had in your eyes when the captain refused to continue the mission … that wasn’t the look of a person who might lose a box with some cargo in it, no matter how valuable. Whatever is on that ship, it’s worth a _lot_ more to you.” She smiles sadly. “Trust me, I know that look.”

“Really?”, Johnson sneers.

“Yeah, I used to have it myself.” Sam pushes away from the wall and cautiously settles down on the bunk, making sure that she sits as far away from Johnson as possible. “I think I get it, you know? You thought you failed. But I don’t think you really believe that die trying to go on wouldn’t make a difference. It would’ve been an easy way out – and you wanted to take it.”

“Shut – up”, Johnson grinds out, pulling her arms tighter around her shins.

“Guess I hit a nerve …”

“What do you even want?”, Johnson snaps. “Gloat, if you like, tie me up or kill me, I don’t care. But get it the fuck over with!”

“I want to help you”, Sam states simply.

Taken aback, Johnson looks at her. “I hurt you, I _just_ told you that I was ready to torture and kill you. Why on god’s fucked-up earth would you want to help me?”

Sam purses her lips. “Gut feeling?”

“That’s a stupid reason.” Resignedly, Johnson waves her hand. “No offense.”

Sam huffs and slightly shakes her head. She takes her time to choose her next words carefully, and to decide how much of herself she’s ready to reveal. “I’ve met my fair share of cutthroats over the last years”, she says eventually. “People who enjoy hurting or killing others. You’re not like them.”

“You have no idea what I’ve done.”

Sam gives her a rueful smile. “Right back at ya.” Thoughtfully, she bites her lip. “We can’t undo what we did, only control what we do going forward. For a lot of things, there’s no forgiveness. But as long as you’re alive, there’s always a chance to make things right again, however small it might be.”

Johnson quirks an eyebrow. “You really believe that?”

“I really have to.”

Sam can see Johnson struggle, opening and closing her mouth again and again. It’s a battle between the wish to talk on one side and an overwhelming urge to distrust on the other, undoubtedly so deeply ingrained in Johnson’s mind that it has long become a constant companion. But Sam does not push, gives her all the time she needs. Because she knows this struggle, recognizes the all too familiar signs. If trust, or faith, or whatever you want to call it doesn’t win now, there might not be another fight ever again.

“It’s my sister.” It comes out as nothing more than horse, choked whisper. “My sister is on that ship.”

Sam slowly exhales, without even knowing why she feels so relieved right now. She puts the question aside for another time. Maybe her capacity for senseless suffering is simply reaching its limits.

Meanwhile, Johnson has removed the locket from her neck. For a few seconds, she almost reverently strokes her thumb over the smooth, golden surface, then opens it. Sam leans forward and discovers a small black-and-white photo of a young woman. She wears glasses, has blond, or maybe light-brown hair, and flashes the brightest smile at the camera that Sam has ever seen. Seeing this happy, open expression alone stings.

“Her name is Kara”, Johnson rasps.

Sam looks up and notices the tears in Johnson’s eyes, but can also see the tremendous effort she makes to keep them from falling. She suppresses the urge to reach out to the other woman, pretty sure she’s not one for physical gestures of support.

“She seems like a damned good reason to give it your all”, Sam says instead, and Johnson nods. She looks completely exhausted, as if this admission had sucked up the last bit of energy that kept her going up until now. At this very instant, Sam knows exactly what she has to do.

They sit in silence for another long moment, then Sam gets up. “I’ll see what I can do”, she promises, warningly pointing a finger at Johnson. “You stay put, or I swear this time you’ll get your easy way out.”

“Okay.”

Sam waits for another beat, but turns to leave when it’s clear that Johnson doesn’t want to say anything else. She’s about to open the door, when the other woman speaks once more.

“Alex.”

The word is whispered so quietly that Sam for a moments doubts she even heard it. “Come again?”

“My name …” Johnson moves her jaw, as if she tries to say words in a language she hasn’t spoken in years. “My name … is Alex Danvers.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, so this took me longer to complete than I thought ... but it's also longer than I thought, so it balances each other out? :-)
> 
> Anyway, thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it and come back for more. Next time: Sam tries to convince Lena to do The Right Thing (TM). And yeah, as of late, I do indeed have something akin to a plan. ;-)
> 
> Stay healthy, stay hydrated, and - above all else - take care of yourself in this hellhole of a year!


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